Monday, January 31.
Another member, to wit, John Fowler, from Kentucky, appeared, and took his seat in the House.
French Spoliations.
Mr. Bayard observed that a resolution offered some days since by a gentleman from New York, (Mr. Mitchill,) of considerable national, and of great individual importance to a large description of citizens, appeared to him to have been disagreed to more from considerations of form than substance; as the merits of the subject were not, on that occasion, brought into discussion. In order to meet the ideas of gentlemen who desired, in the first instance, to decide the principle whether indemnity ought to be made to our merchants, he submitted the following resolution:
Resolved, That provision ought to be made by law, to indemnify the citizens of the United States who, in carrying on a lawful trade to foreign parts, suffered losses by the seizure of their property made by unauthorized French cruisers, or by any French cruiser, without sufficient cause, in violation of the rights of American commerce, during the late war between Great Britain and the French Republic, and whose claims for indemnity against the said Republic were renounced by the United States, by their acceptance of the ratification of the treaty lately made with France.
Mr. Bayard moved the taking up the resolution for consideration; on which the House divided—yeas 39, nays 45. Resolution ordered to lie on the table.
About 3 o'clock the galleries were cleared, and the House remained with closed doors till 4 o'clock, when they adjourned.